#santa-cruz-bicycles

Radar

Prior to the pandemic, Santa Cruz Bicycles sent Josh “Loosedog” Lewis, Iago Garay, Mitch Ropelato and Romain Paulhan down to Chile to find dusty, loose, and rugged trails. This video is the result and is highly worth your time to watch!

Radar

Radar

After covering the Downieville Classic for three years now, I can honestly say if it’s the only MTB race I cover each year, then I’m a-ok with that! The Sierra Buttes Trail Stewardship is the feature in Santa Cruz’s new video, featuring their eMTB the Heckler. If you want to race Downieville this year, I highly suggest it, just don’t miss race registration on MONDAY, February 17th at 8pm PST!

Radar

Trans-Cascadia is a backcountry stage MTB race that takes place in some of the most remote places in the Pacific Northwest. This year, they’ve teamed up with Santa Cruz to raffle off a new Megatower with all the fixin’s. Head on over to throw down $10 for your chance to win!

Reportage
By: erin lamb & john watson

I don’t know what to title it. But the bike is really fun, so this is worth the read. I like to think that the writing is also fun, making it double worth the read.

The bottom line at the top: The new Juliana Joplin ups the “raucous trail ability” of its predecessor a few ticks with the new build: feeling right at home pointing down chunky and steep serpentine terrain, while somehow maintaining that xc pedal-ability we sometimes care about. While the positioning of the historic Juliana Joplin, which launched with the brand in 2013, pointed towards super-capable cross country, this bike and its lineage have always pushed the boundaries of the technical ability of a bike that can still pedal fast.

Reportage
By: John Watson

If a trail is made by humans, versus game or erosion, does it carry along with it historical remnants of the trail builder’s psyche? Humans use tools to create trails and these tools are guided by feats of strength, both physical and mental. What happens when strength is combined with emotion? Are those emotional remnants carried along the path, forever altering the harmony of its intentional meanderment? Trails are all about control. Direction. Intention. Is there a marking of metaphysical energy within them?

Reportage
By: john watson

Last week, we looked at the new Juliana Quincy, through the eyes and words of Amy Jurries and today, I’ll be taking you through the new Stigmata, as someone who rallied and loved the last model. How does it compare? Read on below.

The Santa Cruz Stigmata was truly one of the first disc all-road bikes that opened my eyes to not only what an off-road bike could be, but what it should be. I loved it so much that it influenced the geometry of my Firefly, yet that initial Stigmata review was over four years ago. A lot has changed in that time and the Stiggy was long overdue for an overhaul, mainly in one specific area, the tire clearance!

Reportage
By: Amy Jurries

First Impressions: Meet the New Quincy – Juliana’s Answer to the Popular Stigmata.
Words by Amy Jurries, riding photos by Ian Collins, and bike photos by John Watson

Quincy, California sits at the northern end of the Sierra Nevada mountain range. It’s in the heart of California’s Gold Country where in the mid-1800s, miners from all over the world came for their chance at striking it rich. It’s in part thanks to the Gold Rush that within spitting distance of town, you have access to hundreds of miles of mountainous dirt roads.

While the town itself is small, with not much more than a movie theater and a few places to shop, each year around September the population swells with the crazy two-wheeled set for Grinduro weekend. Juliana’s new drop bar bike, the Quincy, is 100-percent made to rule on this terrain. Before Sea Otter, I was invited down to hang out with the Juliana/Santa Cruz team and test out the Quincy. With a 40+ mile ride in the mountains around Big Basin Redwoods State Park, we rode hard on everything from tarmac connectors and loose chalky gravel to branches, mud, and gopher-hole-checkered grassy downhills.

Radar

When it comes to carbon MTB wheels, Santa Cruz’s Reserve line is quite the deal. With modern rim profiles, minimal branding, and a lifetime warranty, they’re hard to pass up. All they needed to do was offer their rims in dropbar, or all-road friendly shapes. At NAHBS 2019 they did just that, now offering 700c and 650b Reserve Rims, with the same warranty as their MTB rims, all for a retail of $599 a hoop. See more features below.

Radar

Do not adjust your phone, pad, laptop, or desktop computers. This is a real collaboration and you know what? I think it’s awesome. In a completely surprising move, Supreme, purveyors of random wares and streetwear, have teamed up with Santa Cruz Bicycles on a limited edition Chameleon hardtail. Check out the preview at Supreme and expect this to “drop” shortly. Thanks to Johnnie Davis for the heads up! Rumor has it retail will be $2,500.

Radar

You don’t have to live in California, or ride trails in the Sierra, to help the Sierra Trails raise money for their efforts. This year’s $5 a foot fundraiser throws a custom, special edition Santa Cruz Bronson in the ring for a prize.

If you’re not already familiar with $5-Bucks-a-Foot, it’s the Butte’s annual fundraiser where people buy feet of trail ($5 = 1 foot) to enter themselves for a chance at win a Santa Cruz bike. Over the years, $5-Bucks-a-Foot has raised more than $300,000 in funds that have built amazing new Lost Sierra trails like Mills Peak. Enter to win at Sierra Trails and we’ll see ya at Downieville in two weeks!

Radar

Crankworx Les Gets is the backdrop for the latest video from the Syndicate, Santa Cruz’s downhill team. Check it out for some behind the scenes from Jason Marsh and PA Roche as the legendary Steve Peat tries to wrangle them to a common goal: domination.

Reportage
By: John Watson

Tyler wanted to get a limited slip differential installed in his Volvo 142. The problem is, Tyler lives in Santa Cruz where he works for Santa Cruz Bicycles in the design department, and the Volvo experts were down in Long Beach. No one wants to drive from Santa Cruz to Los Angeles on the weekend, and the shop was closed then anyway, so what’s a dude with a slick Volvo to do? The genius of this whole ordeal was that Tyler, and David – two design department dudes at Santa Cruz Bicycles – were able to convince their bosses to let them ride the newest bike models down in Los Angeles, allowing Tyler’s car to get worked on while we shredded some of the area’s best trails. I’m sure it didn’t hurt to have me offer to show them around, ride the new bikes and obviously tell a story about the whole shindig. Sure, this is about the bikes, as much as it is about showing Tyler and David Los Angeles’ best trails in a condensed, two-day experience.

Playing host in Los Angeles is as much fun as it is hard work. Hard in the sense that these are my local trails that I ride quite frequently, so seeing the “new” in the familiar can be photographically challenging. Add to that, technically I’m injured. I found out right before the guys rolled into town that my pinky was indeed broken from a collision with a Prius’ side view mirror one day while I was riding home. That incident happened almost a month prior. Bummer for me, my bike control, and the potential to have a full-on shred fest, but I was so excited to ride the new 5010, so I sucked it up, taped my finger, and clipped in…

The Radavist is a group of individuals who share a love of cycling and the outdoors. We will always stop for a photo, or to hit a jump. We believe the outdoors should be respected. Please, pack it in and pack it out. Leave it better, even. Remember, we’re all ambassadors for cycling, so be polite on the road and the trails and observe the leave no trace principles.